Charging ahead in 2019

What's it like to own an electric car in France?

Around 2009 (10 years ago) I made the decision that I wouldn't buy another new/used gasoline powered car, but I would keep my current car running until I could buy a practical fully electric vehicle (EV). My wish was finally granted about 5 months ago and I hope to shed some desperately needed light on this unnecessarily mysterious technology so that people can make informed decisions about how best to transition to an EV. First I'll give some history, explain general engineering concepts, briefly talk about the various candidate cars, and finally share what is involved in the daily life of owning and driving an EV. The "appendix" at the end shares some specs for competitors and puts theoretical numbers into perspective through application.

Even if you don't agree about the dangers of climate change, oil will be depleted in around 50 years (according to BP's 2012 Statistical Review of World Energy). That means it'll continue increasing in price exponentially, and we should probably be saving what's left of raw crude oil for making plastic materials instead of burning them up for transportation and expelling CO2 into the environment (intensifying the atmospheric greenhouse effect and acidification of the oceans).

History

But enough about why you should (must) switch to an EV, let's talk about some background info on this relatively simple technology. Electric motors have been in practical usage for nearly two centuries (1830's). It shouldn't be too surprising that this preceded common usage of combustion engines by about 40 years, because electric motors are so much more mechanically simple than combustion engines. Since that time, electric motors have been optimized and improvements are still being made today (see modern advances in axial flux motors). EV's have also been around since 1870, but they've never been practical for one main reason -- their batteries.

Batteries

Improving electrical energy storage is a technological barrier that we've slowly been chipping away at, but batteries would still need to double in energy density to resemble something comparable to a modern gasoline powered car. I'd argue that this is very possible and will probably be achieved in 5-10 years, at which point, electric cars would easily be able to achieve a range of 600km on one charge. In the past this was largely thanks to portable devices like smart phones and laptops which have been pushing the technology forward, but now that multiple car manufacturers are taking this competition seriously, it's attracting attention. I believe the next new billionaire will be the person leading the way to design a fast-charging, lightweight, long-lasting electric battery.

Designing batteries compact enough to fit into a car is just one obstacle; the 2nd issue with batteries is their charging rate. Again, this is something that will likely be doubled in the same 5-10. There is already a very wide range of charging rates available, but their price range matches accordingly. Battery capacity has been increasing while their costs simultaneously decreasing, and EV's will likely surpass gasoline cars in both categories easily by 2030 (especially if you account for savings in fuel costs). Later I will give some specific examples and numbers, so stay tuned!


Lastly, batteries are designed to operate mainly between 20-80% of full capacity. In fact, they typically charge more slowly above 80% and supposedly degrade the battery slightly more quickly when charged to 100% frequently or when allowed to drain to nearly 0%.

Maybe someday we'll circumvent the need for batteries entirely if we can provide the power directly like trains do.

About me

During my undergraduate studies in 2007, I participated in an overseas summer internship at BMW in Munich, Germany where I learned about the latest M3 V8 engines on the assembly line. Upon returning home I also took a college course on Internal Combustion Engines (ICE) to solidify my theoretical background with them. They were fascinating and I enjoyed learning about their complexities. Two years later around 2009 during my masters degree I dove deeply into studying gas turbo-machinery using computational fluid dynamics (CFD) where I learned that turbines offered an obvious efficiency improvement over ICE's, but were not practical for use in small vehicles. Very recently during my 2016 post-doc I started learning about combustion modeling (mainly for turbines) and throughout all of this experience one thing has stood out out for certain -- these mechanical machines are overly-complicated and rather inefficient at turning fossil fuels into rotational energy/motion. There are better ways to achieve motion than burning oil. It's been difficult for society to wean away, mainly driven by the fact that the fossil fuel industry is so entrenched in its ways and expects ever increasing returns on their investments. The industry has setup a worldwide conglomerate of infrastructure to support securing fossil fuel sources, then its extraction, transportation, refinement, and consumption. They've spent billions of dollars making it as convenient as possible to provide fuel for your vehicle and ensure that you'll keep needing it, hiding (out-of-sight and out-of-mind) the background process as much as possible, and have also earned an exorbitant amount of profit in doing so.

I'm really glad that I didn't end my education at a bachelor's degree. The difference between the focus on course material was immense. It was less about preparing students to work for profit, crunching numbers, and memorizing methods/equations, but more focused on critical thinking skills to solve big societal challenges. Or at least I felt that it enabled me to do so. Just at or before the start of my PhD, I enrolled in three separate courses: renewable energy, solar power, and environmental engineering, and I was made aware of various future possibilities (which I'll share in more detail later). That's when I made the critical decision and commitment to never buy another gasoline vehicle again, even if it meant spending a little more.

My gasoline car

My first new car was a 2002 Volkswagen GTI, and it came installed with a turbo charger that gave it an impressive 100hp (horsepower) per liter (of engine displacement). This is a measure of power density, meaning that a small 1.8L (4 cylinder) engine producing 180hp could fit into a pretty small car (by American standards because the GTI is actually one of the larger models in Europe). This was pretty impressive at that time, made possible because a turbo charger improves an ICE by bringing it closer to the thermodynamic cycle of a gas turbine. Most recent cars have focused on fuel efficiency rather than acceleration, so while I was able to achieve a consistent 28 miles per gallon (MPG) equivalent to 8.4 l/100km with my good driving habits, most econo cars today can achieve twice that or approach 3x that if they exploit a technology known as "regenerative braking."

Engineering Concepts

Feel free to skip this section if you already familiar with these engineering concepts.

Regenerative Braking

If you didn't know this already, one of the coolest things about electric motors is that they are ALSO electric generators! They can seamlessly switch between opposite roles, either

• Consume input electricity to produce an output torque
• Apply an input torque to generate output electricity

depending on whichever you need (vehicle acceleration or deceleration respectively). Most people understand intuitively that a motor consumes electricity to produce a torque (on car wheels to accelerate a car forward), but Regenerative braking is the opposite process of recapturing wheel motion (rotational kinetic energy) via an electric generator to re-produce electricity. This technology was successfully deployed in hybrid vehicles a decade ago with small batteries so that some of the energy during braking could be recaptured, stored, and used later to help re-accelerate the vehicle back up-to-speed, effectively increasing the city mileage by around 40%. This benefit is noticeable mainly in stop-and-go city driving, but has near-zero benefit on highways where braking is seldom used. This means that all EVs will natively support regenerative braking, as it adds almost no extra engineering requirements or costs. Electric trains have been using this technology for many decades because they don't need batteries, they just feed electricity back into the grid whenever they slow down.

As a side note, in 2008 my mechanical engineering senior project was to design a regenerative braking system for a bicycle. We all decided that an electric motor and battery was the most efficient/easiest way to go, but that it would be too expensive (exceeding our $100 budget) and didn't pertain to mechanical engineering as much as it does electrical engineering. So the class explored other alternatives, but ultimately we all decided to use elastic energy storage mediums, e.g. winding/stretching springs and bungee cords to slow down a moving bike and convert its kinetic energy into elastic energy. Methods of capture and storage aren't limited to just electrical or elastic energy either, but those two turned out to be the most applicable for a bicycle.

Hybrid cars combine the best of both worlds, longer range with the regenerative braking of an EV, but it leaves the vehicle heavily dependent upon all the disadvantages of an ICE.

Efficiency Losses

You may be surprised to learn that the typical ICE in a consumer car only achieves around 20% thermal efficiency (25% for diesels). This means that out of the total heat capacity of the fuel consumed by the engine, only one fifth of it is actually being converted into rotational kinetic energy (to accelerate your vehicle). The other 3/4th's are going into generating waste heat, noise, and wearing/grinding down metal/rubber/plastic parts.

That small fraction of energy that actually does manage to make it to the output crankshaft then has to overcome additional energy losses:

• Transmission (manual/automatic transmission)
• Drive train (shafts/axles)
• Rolling-resistance (tires and bearings)
• Air resistance (body drag from movement through air)

before actually making the vehicle accelerate forward. The last two are pretty similar for all cars regardless of the motor type, but the first two can be reduced significantly in electric cars. An electric motor only needs a very simple transmission that lets you switch between park, drive, neutral, and reverse. In other words, there are very few mechanical aspects (moving parts, gears, etc) in the transmission, and it's mostly an electrical engineering concern which reduces the weight and increases the reliability significantly. The fewer moving parts, the better.

Secondly, axles spanning across the vehicle body can be removed entirely if individual motors are placed directly at each wheel. This gives superb computer assisted traction control capabilities and removes some of the losses incurred by shaft bearings and differentials, decreases the rotational inertia of the axles, and decreases the overall weight (linear inertia) of the car. Less inertia means more acceleration and less rolling resistance.

Electric vs. combustion motors

"Silence is the sound of efficiency" -Me, circa 2010 (annoyed anytime a loud muffler motorcycle/car passed by me).

An electric motor produces a maximum torque at 0 rpm (revolutions per minute) and diminishes gradually at higher rpm, whereas the torque curve of an ICE is a rather complex curve depending on many factors (timings, fuel ratios, spray configurations, turbulent airflow, boost, compression ratios, just to name a few).

Example curves for a typical ICE

Additionally, an ICE needs a starter (and battery) to bring it above the self-sustaining idle rpm and must be disengaged from the wheels while continuing to consume fuel while idling to prevent stalling. Furthermore, a clutch and transmission must also slowly apply the vehicle's load onto the engine to keep it from stalling and requires the use of gear ratios to keep the wheel rpm in the operating range of the engine rpm (1000-8000 typically).

An electric motor has neither of these issues, as it doesn't need to startup, idle, or consume any energy when stopped, and can apply a massive peak torque from a standstill nearly instantaneously (though software controllers usually apply a smooth ramp-up function to act as a "digital clutch"). In an optimal configuration, the torque would theoretically decay inversely proportionally to its rpm so as to maintain a constant flat power curve, but in reality for a DC motor it's closer to an inverse linear curve with a max power somewhere around half of its max rpm.

1999 Center for Innovation in Product Development

I haven't tried this yet myself, but an electric motor theoretically performs practically identically in forward or reverse rotation, which is why a Nissan Leaf set a record time averaging 55mph entirely in reverse on racetrack!

EV's are very self-contained closed systems (once charged), meaning that their operation doesn't intake air or produce exhaust pollutants. This means that crowded cities full of EV's would have much cleaner breathable air and be significantly (eerily) quiet. Furthermore, since EV's don't need oxygen, they perform just as well in high elevations or even technically underwater (deep puddles).

Maintenance 

Maybe you've grown accustomed to it, but the maintenance on ICE cars is fairly frequent and costly. If you're like me, then you're tired of buying parts designed to wear out (including brake pads, oil filters, drive belts, air filters, spark plugs, etc.). Oil changes may be one of the most frequent and annoying aspects of owning an ICE Vehicle (ICEV). The oil must be exchanged every 5k-10k miles, and even if you drive infrequently (like I did) then you still have to change the oil every 6-8 months because it degrades over time.

Friction brake pads are another important topic because they're consumed much more slowly in vehicles equipped with regenerative braking. Traditional friction brakes are only used to supplement the regenerative braking when the generator and/or battery are unable to absorb rapid incoming energy coming from the wheels during hard-braking. The common ground vehicle has been wasting useful energy by heating and grinding metal pads into dust... for over a century... this has been the predominant method of slowing down cars without recapturing any of that motion (kinetic energy).

Fuel

I've also become weary of purchasing gasoline knowing the harm the oil procurement, extraction, and emissions has on societal conflicts and the environment respectively. EV's obviously still have impacts on the environment, but relatively much less so than ICE vehicles. No one should be expecting EV's to be a perfect solution to all environmental problems, but it's a big leap in the right direction. For one, electrifying ground transportation and its infrastructure prepares us for newly incoming renewable energy sources. Wind, solar, and nuclear energy will directly power our cars in the near future. Here in France, 75%+ of electricity is from nuclear, so I guess you could say that my car runs on nuclear power 😎. In Europe, gasoline costs between 2-3 times as much as in the USA, which provided more than enough incentive for me (and many others) to switch to an EV. But for now the focus has predominately been on marketing luxury/performance EV's because they're already far superior to similar ICEV's in almost every aspect.

Let's also take a moment to recognize that mankind is on track to deplete Earth's oil reserves in just another 50 years (about a total of two centuries), but that crude oil required tens of millions of years to form underground. In other words, we're consuming it at a rate about 100,000 times faster than it's forming... a very unsustainable and irresponsible behavior. The coming paradigm shift will be to embrace distributed energy sources that capture "directly" from the sun, like wind, solar, and hydroelectric. I say "direct" because wind is a consequence of temperature and pressure differences in the atmosphere caused by scattered sunlight patterns, precipitation (for hydroelectric power) is caused by evaporation from the sun, and solar power absorbs photons/radiation directly from the sun. These are all great, but have extra challenges because they are erratically dispersed with some unpredictability in smaller concentrations. However, the "fuel" is freely available as long as the sun keeps burning. Switching away from centralized power generation (coal, oil, nuclear) to a distributed network poses some infrastructure challenges with power transmission and storage, but in the 21st century, there's no question about whether we have the ability to do it, we obviously can 😅. If fusion energy makes some breakthroughs then it would allow centralized power to remain a dominant infrastructure architecture for the foreseeable future.

It's important to note that gasoline can also be used to generate electricity, at a much higher efficiency than small ICE's are capable of in a typical car. By scaling up the design and using a gas turbine, the fuel can be converted into electricity at a rate closer to 60% efficiency! This means that even if we still used gasoline to generate electricity at a centralized plant to charge electric vehicles, we'd be 30% better off overall.

Power vs. Energy

If you're familiar with physics/engineering you can skip this section, but before I go any further I want to clear-up the common confusion around the two distinct units of energy and power. A Joule is a common unit used to describe any type of energy (or work), whether it's kinetic, electrical, thermal, gravitational, elastic, chemical, etc. It's what you could store in a "battery" for later use. Power is a rate of energy, typically measured in Joules per second (also commonly known as a Watt), and is used to describe how quickly energy is being consumed/produced (that is to say, a transfer rate between energy types). If my battery stores 500 Joules, then it could power a 100W light bulb for 5 seconds. As you probably gathered from this example, a Joule is a very small amount of energy. Household items usually range between a few hundred Watts up to a few kiloWatts (kW). For example, microwaves increase the thermal energy content of your food at a rate of about 1kW (1000W). A typical household wall outlet can supply up to a maximum of around 3kW of power.

You may be familiar with the archaic unit known as "horespower", well that's just 0.75kW (=746Watts), they're both units of power. ICE power is traditionally measured in horsepower (USA) or kW (the rest of the world). I'll just stick to kW for now because it makes EV charging much easier to explain/calculate.

Returning to energy, you may have wondered, "what the heck is a kWh?" You've probably seen it on your electricity bills, but the name "kiloWatt-hour" is confusing because it multiplies a rate by a time, which cancels-out leaving just a unit of energy. Basically a kWh is the amount of energy resulting from 1kW of power transfer for 1 hour of time, or 3.6 MJ (3,600,000 Joules). It's pretty amazing that it only costs a dime or two for that much energy.

Vehicle Candidates

I kept my VW GTI running happily for 15 years until I sold it after moving to Europe, then I relied on public transportation for 2 years (luckily this is a viable option in big European cities like Paris) before beginning my search for a practical daily commuter EV. I've listed below the options I was aware of at the time:

• Tesla Model S ($60k-90k)
• Tesla Model 3 ($40k-60k)
• BMW i3 ($45k+)
• Nissan Leaf ($30k)
• Renault Zoe ($20k with battery rental)

The one vehicle that stood-out uniquely was the Renault Zoe, and because of the price, it was the only one I ever seriously considered; and it's not even available in the USA! The Zoe provided the option to rent the battery (that's partly why it's significantly cheaper). I'll explain more details on that later.

The battery rental cost is similar (or less than) what you'd expect to put into the maintenance of an ICEV, but spread out evenly at regular predictable intervals with far fewer unexpected maintenance issues. And I'm guessing that in 5-10 years when I receive a new battery, it will be a newer model with a larger capacity and possibly a faster charging/rate, so my range will be upgraded, either that or the monthly price will decrease. The French government is still giving a €6k Euro stipend right off the price of the car at the dealership to encourage people to purchase EV's.

Charging locations

If you own/rent a home with a garage/carport, you really don't have to worry about anything. You can conveniently charge your car overnight once per week. Otherwise, I highly recommend the chargemap free app/website to find information about charging locations, connectors, speeds, and prices, mostly via community-driven data. You can optionally buy a Chargemap pass ($20) and use it on many participating charging stations, I'd estimate that about half of the charging stations are compatible with it. The goal is to help unify the many diverse charging companies and let you pay a flat rate with just one card. As it stands now, there are many small competitors each with their own small territories (about 10km radius). I guess that's OK if you never travel too far from home, but long roadtrips require planning in advance all the places you will charge, and even prepare some alternate backups. This can be a little tedious the first time around, but repeating trips is much easier later. You'll learn to trust some stations more than others. All of this should get better in the future too, and I recommend planning your roadtrips along free charging stations. Some supermarkets (Lidl, E.Leclerc, IKEA, etc.) offer free charging (may require free membership), but there as much incentive to keep free charging stations well-maintained, so they're not as reliable as the ones you pay for. Again, Chargemap's community is usually pretty good at warning you when stations are out-of-service.

European reader: Renault discontinued their Z.E. Pass partnership, but you can still buy the KiWhi Pass individually, and it offers amazing membership rates allowing customers to recharge at participating stations at a massive discount. I chose the COMFORT plan which costs only €24/year and just 35 cents per charge! It's practically free.

Charging Connector Types

This part is unnecessarily confusing. From what I understand, there are many types of connectors/plugs, but with 3 main types:

• Type 2 (Europe/USA car manufacturers)
• CHAdeMO (Japanese car manufacturers)
• Tesla (Tesla only)

Some of these are obsolete

A Tesla car with support for Tesla's charger AND the type 2 port

Type 2 seems the most promising to me. Tesla is even now providing dual connections to include the Type 2 connector (120kW) on newer vehicles for their European market. So it will probably come down to a battle between Western and Eastern manufacturers, and who knows if we'll ever decide on a single universal standard (I sure hope we do). Again, Chargemap is an excellent resource to find out which stations are compatible with your vehicle's port(s).

The following terms are used to describe the charging rates:

• < 7kW "slow"
• 11kW-22kW "fast"
• > 40kW "rapid"

Your car will usually come with an adapter cable so that you can plug into any standard wall outlet and charge at 3kW max.

Renault Zoe

I decided to focus on the Renault Zoe because it seemed like the most practical option in France (and also if you live in Germany or the UK). I liked that the battery rental emulated what we're accustomed to as customers, paying maintenance over the lifetime instead of all upfront. First I looked for used cars, but there were very few to be found. Seems that people are generally very happy with them. I've heard it's difficult to find a used Tesla too, and EV's depreciate in value slower than ICEV's because they're more reliable. Tesla provides an (8 year) infinite mile warranty to reflect that! See the section below about battery warranties that blow ICEV's out of the water.

With a Zoe I'd be able to:

• Commute (40km per day) to work only needing to charge once per week.
• Never need oil changes again.
• Easily make trips up to 230km away.
• Make practical trips up to 500km in a single day stopping once to fully recharge.
• Free parking in Paris (while Autolib is transitioning).
• "My Z.E." perks.

The online "My ZE" account lets you remotely view the status of your car battery level, schedule charging times, pre air-condition the cabin, etc.

So I finally made the leap and purchased a new 2018 Renault Zoe R90 Intens in September. The "90" stands for the motor's horsepower rating (90hp = 65kW), and the "R" means it's the slower charging model (22kW). The high-end "Q" model can charge twice as fast (43kW), and there's also a 110hp motor version, but both of those upgrades cost extra. Other special features (paint job, rims, upholstery, rear-view camera, automatic headlights/wipers, GPS, etc.) all cost extra too. The "Intens" version I bought included almost all of those features.

The Zoe's power system includes a traditional 12V lead-acid car battery for emergencies to power the computer/lights in case the main drive battery fails or fully drains. I suspect other brands may use similar setups because it's so similar to the electrical system of ICEV's. From what I could gather, the Zoe always keeps the backup 12V battery fully-charged, and it means that you can easily jump-start a dead ICEV with regular jumper cables. I know because I tried it successfully and didn't even need to have my EV powered "on."

The Driving Experience

Once you test drive an electric car, you might fall in in love immediately like I did. The quiet uninterrupted smooth torque is remarkable. The only sound is the wind outside. The only vibration comes from the tires on the road. Driving down a curvy highway feels like gliding through the air. You'll soon wonder how you tolerated an ICEV for so long.

Battery Rental

Customers can choose to buy the main drive battery upfront for an extra €9k or they could pay a monthly fee and when the battery decays below 75% of its original full capacity, it is replaced for free. This contract transfers to the new owner if you sell the vehicle. Depending on the annual driving distances, the battery rental price varies between €69-€239 per month, but they offer an unlimited distance plan for €119/month, so I'm not sure why anyone would ever pay more than that. I chose the 12,500km per year plan for €89/month, which is about what I'm saving in gasoline for the same distance.

Warranty, reliability, and Maintenance

If the maintenance is truly significantly less than an ICEV, I should be saving lots of money in the long term. The Zoe is at most €4k more expensive than a similar ICEV counterpart, so the return on investment should take only a few years. In fact, if you choose to buy the 40ZE battery upfront instead of renting it, Renault guarantees that it will sustain 66% of its initial capacity for up to 8 years or 160,000km (100,000 miles).

Competitors

A Tesla can charge at an impressive 120kW rate and their batteries store around 100kWh. Remarkably, Audi is planning to release the E-Tron that can charge at 150kW and Porsche the Taycan at 350kW! That is insane, but I wouldn't expect that to be affordable for most mainstream consumer vehicles for another 10-15 years.

Perspective

Based on my driving habits, I'm saving about €1,000 ($1,200) annually on gasoline, and am spending only about $1 per full charge with the membership, about $50 annually. The price of electricity in Europe is similar to the US, between 15-20 cents per kWh, so charging my Zoe from home would cost:

0.15 [€/kWh] * 40 kWh = €6

and scheduling the car to only charge during off-peak hours could save $1-2 per charge if you have one of those power plans. However, it's usually even cheaper than that if you charge at a station or have a membership. Not only is it faster than a standard home wall outlet (most non-Tesla stations currently range between 7kW-60kW) but you'll pay closer to:

€1 / 40 [kWh] = 0.03 [€/kWh]

3 cents/kWh. At least for now while the government is providing incentives with subsidies. And don't forget that many FREE charging stations still exist. My car can only charge at a rate up to 22kW, which means it takes about 2 hours to fill up all 41kWh from empty:

41 [kWh] / 22 [kW]  = 1.86 [h]

But in practice there are some energy losses incurred by the battery charging and seems to require around 15% longer in my experience. I typically charge my Zoe from 20 → 90% in 90 minutes. If the car battery is in below freezing temperatures, it could be an additional 5-10% slower. This is another perk for homeowners who have the option of charging their car in a warm garage.

Just to give some more perspective on energy and power magnitudes, if my car was capable of absorbing all the power coming from a (moderately large) 1MW wind turbine, it would take about 2 minutes to fully charge my car's battery (41kWh), and allow me to drive 320km +/- 50km.

41 [kWh] * 3600 [s/h] / 1000 [kW/MW] = 147 [s]

After driving an EV for a few months, ICEV's now resemble glorified model-T Fords from the 1920's with their loud, smelly, greasy, and less reliable design. Once you go EV, you'll never go ICEV again.

Why we should either abolish the electoral college or use it for once

The electoral college (EC) has an interesting history, and during the 56 presidential elections, 5 have selected the candidate opposing the national popular vote. This suggests evaluating the EC to understand its purpose, original intent, whether it's behaving as designed, and possible improvements.

1) The people (not states) should elect the president:

Hamilton wrote in the Federalist 68 that,

"the Executive should be independent for his continuance in office on all but the people themselves."

i.e., the president should be accountable to the people -- not states, Senators, Representatives, judges, governors, etc. The EC shouldn't favor citizens in less populous states because every American's vote for president should indiscriminately count equally. The framers didn’t care whether small states had a say in electing the President. They were concerned about small states’ representation in Congress, which is why regardless of population, each state receives two Senators. As a side note, the U.S.’s first government system (embodied in the Articles of Confederation) only lasted from 1781 - 1789 and failed because it gave too much power to the states and kept the federal government too weak. Under the revised Constitution, the power to govern comes from the people, and not from the states. Two things happen in each states' winner-take-all approach. First, anyone who voted for the losing candidate has their vote switched to the winning candidate. Even if you didn't bother to vote at all, your non-vote still counts toward the states’ winning candidate merely for existing in that states' population. America is quite purple. Secondly, any votes cast in excess of the 50% majority are wasted votes. Optimally you'd aim to win states by very small margins to maximize the number of votes "flipped". Doesn't this sound familiar? Ah yes, it's a form of state-level gerrymandering that receives much attention from campaign strategists, which brings us to the next point.

2) Swing states shouldn't receive the spotlight:

In the current system, only a handful of swing states determine the election's outcome, so only their local issues receive attention from campaigns/candidates while the majority of states/people are ignored.

3) Slavery maintained the EC when it was under revision in 1803:

The 12th amendment revised the presidential/VP election process, and the idea of removing the EC was proposed, but had no chance of succeeding because it protected the slave states. Slaves were partially counted toward the populations of states (but slaves couldn't vote), so this gave the non-colored citizens living in southern states significantly more voting power, and they were unwilling to remove the EC.

4) The original core intent of the EC is not being applied:

In short, the EC was designed to prevent the population from doing something stupid. Its purpose was to allow the population to choose their president while retaining the ability of the electors to override that decision if necessary. More specifically, the framers wanted to ensure the population didn't elect a president who was:

• Unqualified 
• The product of mere popularity, intrigue, or an extraordinary or violent movement
• Chosen under improper influence of a foreign power

See Alexander Hamilton's Federalist 68.

This video explains the EC’s power during the 2016 election. Ironically, the EC didn't seem to exercise any independent judgment whatsoever, partially because its never needed to before. In fact, 29 states have enacted laws prohibiting Electors from voting for anybody other than their state's winning candidate. However, these laws have been largely unchallenged and are most likely unconstitutional because they oppose the very purpose of the EC.

To quote my friend Michael Malin, the existence of these laws just proves further that few people "[...] seriously believe that the Electoral College still does the job the framers envisioned: thoroughly examining the candidates and saving the people from themselves when the situation calls for it. The Electoral College has become a rubber stamp for the winning party in each state. Instead of doing a meaningful job of vetting the candidates one last time before inauguration, the Electoral College distorts the popular vote and serves as a mechanism for campaign strategizing.
So, understanding what the Electoral College is supposed to do and what it actually does, what should we do with it? Do we think that our information technology, radically superior to that of the 18th Century, eliminates the need for a smaller learned body of people to investigate our presidential candidates? Do we believe that over two hundred years of Electors following their partisan leanings has shown that the Electoral College will never take its role seriously?
Or do we still think it’s a good idea to limit the will of the people in order to ensure the president is qualified, serious, and not a foreign agent? And if so, do we need to change the Electoral College to make sure it actually does its job, instead of rubber-stamping the party nominee? Either way, the Electoral College isn’t working how it’s supposed to, and probably won’t until we fix it or eliminate it.
If the Electoral College was to do its job and properly evaluate the candidates, there is no way it would find Trump 'eminently qualified.' Trump is above all else the product of popularity and intrigue. He is a reality show star that was able to continuously conjure up free press through controversy after controversy, at the expense of almost any comprehension or discussion of policy. And foreign influence? I don’t know how much Russia actually cared about the election, but it seems they were at least somewhat interested in either helping Trump or hurting Clinton. Surely Trump is the sort of choice that the Electoral College was created for, to protect us from ourselves. What’s funny is that the Electoral College isn’t protecting us from ourselves. The popular vote chose the candidate that was more qualified, less intriguing, and was the target of foreign opposition. It is the Electoral College that is thrusting the dangerous candidate on us."

What now?

In conclusion, I’d like to suggest some courses of action. As I see it, there are four general outcomes of the 2016 election:

Option 1 (most likely): The EC blindly elects Trump without any consideration to their roles as "evaluators". The EC system is waiving its power, ignoring the original intent, and proving its vestigiality/obsolescence. Therefore, it should be abolished immediately (like removing a ruptured appendix) and replaced with a national popular vote.

Option 2: The EC exercises their right and finds that Trump is very under-qualified, thus choosing a different candidate. Then the EC system remains intact, because for the first time in history it is finally fulfilling its purpose.

Option 3: Many of the Electors become faithless electors and do try to override Trump’s presidency, but fail to reach number required. Both the presidential nominee and the EC remain intact.

Option 4: Compromise. Switch to a popular vote to determine the presidential winner within each state, but also keep Electors as evaluators and allow them to have the final say. This can be achieved without a constitutional amendment using a National Popular Vote Interstate Compact, which already has 60% of the state participation that it needs. Here electoral votes are awarded proportionally instead of winner-take-all.

Science as a belief system

By Aaron Davidson (Philosophy of Science)

       As humans we are born into this world without any preexisting knowledge about our universe. In order to cope and survive, we must make observations and draw conclusions from them. Without making observations and generalizations we cannot make sense of our surroundings. From birth, formulating a belief system is essential to our survival, and perhaps even to our consciousness. Although all that exists for the individual is one’s subjective experiences, an external objective reality must be assumed in order to function on a level beyond your average garden vegetable.

        Obviously there is an infinite set of beliefs one can believe in, but most would be nearly as useless as having no belief system at all. As belief systems grow in complexity, beyond simple common sense generalizations, these systems attempt to also explain and understand. Belief systems can be classified into two basic flavors: science and religion.

        What are the distinctions between a science and a religion? At first glance one might be inclined to state that a science is a system where beliefs are derived from objective methodologies and that a religion is a system of beliefs based on faith. However, a conscious entity practicing science can only draw on its subjective experiences to form beliefs. This means that no matter how objective science appears to be, there are generally two assumptions which musty be taken entirely on faith.

       1) There exists an external objective reality

       2) There exists some sort of uniformity through time

              a) the universe has structure

              b) predictions and generalizations are possible.

       Even though these assumptions exist in science it should be noted that as stated before, there is no way around them if we are to attempt to function without difficulty in this universe. Marvin Minsky (1985) has an interesting view of this problem. The limits to human knowledge are created when the questions being asked are circular. For example, asking what caused the universe is asking what causes a cause. This circularity indicates that the question is unanswerable by its very nature.

        Other than those assumptions which are absolutely necessary, science rejects assumptions of faith. Science is a belief system which aims to minimize faith. Religion, on the other hand, is a belief system based completely on faith. This is a satisfactory distinction, but I feel we can make the difference much clearer.

•       One of the greatest features of science is that it works as an algorithmic process of belief revision. No scientific belief being held can be said to be absolutely true, no matter how convincing it is. This is how science compensates for the small amount of faith it requires. All scientific beliefs are wrapped in a protective condition: A scientific belief can only be true if the basic assumptions of science are true, and absolute certainty cannot be obtained due to the problems inherited from subjectivity. All scientific statements have a built in emergency exit! Beliefs are able to change in light of new evidence or ideas.

        Religion in this regard, is a polar opposite. Beliefs are dictated and taken on faith. Belief revision is not encouraged. Indeed, religion has difficulty changing its dogma when pressured. Take for example, Christianity’s recent struggles to keep up with the rapidly changing times. Changes in the Christian belief system have had to been made with regards to the equality of women, homosexuality, and other social changes in our modern cultures. Belief systems which are based around faith change painfully and slowly.

•       Another potential distinction to make between science and religion is explanatory power. Both science and religion attempt to explain things. Religion, however, has less explanatory power than science does. Religions typically explain things by inventing a supernatural entity as the cause, which explains nothing since the supernatural entities require an even more complicated explanation of their own existence. Science, on the other hand often breaks problems up into sub problems, which are easier to explain (a process known as reduction) and explanations are only accepted when there is evidence to support them, and that the explanations are explainable themselves.

       When suggesting that science has more explanatory power over a religion, one must be careful. Science may often seem to be ‘making up’ new entities and constructs in order to explain things. If an entity such as an electron, which is not directly observable, is hypothesized to explain some occurrence, how does it have more explanatory power than hypothesizing supernatural beings such as little invisible demons? There are several reasons why an electron would be chosen over an invisible demon.

1. Simplicity. Ockham’s razor. Science seeks for an explanation with the least resistance. Invisible demons would require vast amounts of new theories and complex explanations to support them.
2. Broad explanatory power. Electrons, as simple a concept as they are can be used to explain a wide repertoire of phenomena.
3. Evidence. Although direct observations of electrons are not possible, indirect observations provide plenty of evidence that electrons are real things, and not just a fancy idea. Invisible Demons and other supernatural entities are unobservable by definition.

      “An entity which is neither observable nor fulfills any explanatory function can have no interest for us.”

               — A.J. Ayer

       Historically religion has explained the things that science could not. We are all familiar with religious concepts such as the soul which ‘explain’ consciousness, and creationism which ‘explains’ the beginning of time and the origin of the earth and life.

        Typically, religion avoids the ‘hard’ sciences where verification of theories is easier and proof is evident in technologies developed from scientific theories. No church questions the periodic table of the elements, or the theories behind how a jumbo jet stays in the air. But when it comes to scientific theories which attempt to explain occurrences such as the human mind, or events of the distant past — inherently difficult to observe phenomena, religion and science butt heads.

        The theory of evolution by natural selection is a wonderful example of how science is able to combat teleological explanations of the origin of natural complexity. It can explain how we can have the diversity of complex life forms we see today in terms of existing scientific beliefs. Religious accounts of creation may explain how the earth and life began, but this always relies on creating some new entity whose existence remains unexplained.

A Scientific View of Religion

       To showcase the explanatory power of science, I will give a scientific explanation of religion My explanation will focus around the concept of a meme, an idea proposed by Evolutionary Biologist Richard Dawkins. Memes are analogous to genes, but rather than based on the hereditary chemical structures of DNA in cells, a meme is an idea which propagates from mind to mind. To quote Dawkins himself:

      Examples of memes are tunes, ideas, catch-phrases, clothes fashions, ways of making pots or of building arches. Just as genes propagate themselves in the gene pool by leaping from body to body via sperm or eggs, so memes propagate themselves in the meme pool by leaping from brain to brain via a process which, in the broad sense, can be called imitation. If a scientist hears, or reads about, a good idea, he passes it on to his colleagues and students. He mentions it in his articles and his lectures. If the idea catches on, it can be said to propagate itself, spreading from brain to brain.       Memes should be regarded as living structures, not just metaphorically but technically. When you plant a fertile meme in my mind, you literally parasitize my brain, turning it into a vehicle for the meme's propagation in just the way that a virus may parasitize the genetic mechanism of a host cell. And this isn't just a way of talking -- the meme for, say, 'belief in life after death' is actually realized physically, millions of times over, as a structure in the nervous systems of people all over the world.

       The various popular religious memes are highly prevalent in the minds of the human population, and for very good reasons. Memes such as religious faith are very powerful. Faith is the notion of accepting a belief without adequate proof. The faith meme sneakily disables the critical thinking needed to refute it just as HIV disables the immune system — a body’s defense against a virus. The meme is generally introduced into minds starting at a young age, when critical belief systems are still being formed and the mind is particularly vulnerable to faith's attack. Its third advantage is of wide establishment. The faith meme has been around for thousands of years, long before any competitors such as science arrived. Faith is also often psychologically comforting when compared to the often harsh scientific world view.

Prophecies, Predictions, and Coincidences

       A basic rule of thumb in science is that bold predictions are unlikely to come true unless there is some element of truth behind a theory. One of the most often used arguments for defending a non-scientific world view is that of prophecies and coincidences. Whether it is the predictions of Nostradamus or the prophecies of the Bible, it is often asserted that these bold claims show that something beyond science’s explanation is going on. Spiritualists often appeal to our everyday experiences of ‘strange’ coincidences. They say that coincidences occur too often and are too unlikely to occur simply by chance. Something must be going on, or that some hidden plan is at work.

        This problem easily vanishes under careful examination. Our brains are incredibly adept at pattern recognition. We can recognize a person’s face from any angle and we can identify who that person is. We can recognize a two dimensional picture of that person, and we can still recognize them if they have aged or had a face lift. We can read typefaces in thousands of different fonts, and handwriting of all sorts. We draw analogies between thoughts and ideas which have similar features we can recognize.

        For example, I recall my father excitedly telling me about a coincidence which he had encountered. A business which had caused him great suffering was being shut down by the government on his birthday. This seemed for him, to demonstrate karma in action, and indeed it does seem like a strange coincidence. Doing the math however, tells a different story. The chances of the business being shut down on the same day as his birthday is roughly 1 in 365, which is still in the realm of general possibility. Since his birthday is the last day in September and it is more likely by human conventions a business would be shut down on the last day of a month, this brings the probability of it happening closer to 1 in 12.

       Imagine how many thousands, or perhaps even millions of distinct events happen in your life each and every day. The vast majority of these events will have little interest and go unnoticed. The moment an event occurs with some sort of recognizable, but unordinary pattern to it, your brain brings it to your attention as something special. It is inevitable that two unrelated events will coincide with some sort of interesting ‘sameness’ to them. The moment this happens, we take notice.

       As is the case with coincidence, is the case with prophecies and predictions. The vast majority of predictions never turn out to be true, but despite this they are ignored. On the rare occasion that a psychic prediction comes true, they are celebrated as positive instances and confirmation of psychic abilities. Non-scientific belief models are not held accountable for their failures, only their successes. Often, non-scientific belief models must be defended to absurd lengths: 

       ...ESP often seems to manifest itself outside of the laboratory, but when brought into the laboratory, it vanishes mysteriously. The standard scientific explanation for this is that ESP is a nonreal phenomenon which cannot stand up to rigorous scrutiny. ...believers in ESP have a peculiar way of fighting back, however. They say, “No, ESP is real; it simply goes away when one tries to observe it scientifically—it is contrary to the nature of a scientific worldview.” This is an amazingly brazen technique, which we might call “kicking the problem upstairs”. What that means is, instead of questioning the matter at hand, you call into doubt theories belonging to a higher level of credibility. (Hofstadter 1979)

Why I'm not purely an Athiest

Atheism is the opposite extreme to theism as both claim to know something without proof. Although I'm nearly certain a "god" doesn't exist as depicted by most mainstream religions, it is still feasible that a higher entity has the capacity to engineer things beyond our current comprehension. Furthermore, claiming there is/isn't a “god” assumes too much knowledge about what “god” is.

Human perception of the universe is biased and always changing... thus to follow a belief “religiously” is ignorant; conversely, to follow a belief “scientifically” is to be willing to relinquish that belief on a whim should contradictory evidence be discovered.

I mostly follow beliefs "scientifically", but this implies that they're likely to alter/improve in the near future. Maybe my strongest belief is that the scientific process will enlighten and lead us.

Many of the old writings and tales from the bible (and other religious writings) offer advice, but they shouldn't be taken as historical facts without scrutiny. It's fine to base moral beliefs on certain aspects or stories (so long as they don't contradict scientific findings), but that moral belief alone isn't "religious". I'm particularly annoyed by those who pick-and-choose which parts to believe. Most religions do not give this "wiggle room". The scriptures either need to be accepted in their entirety as the infallible word of “god” or rejected under the concept that it was merely invented by archaic men (glorified cavemen) who had vastly limited views of the universe. Calling a book "infallible" is an extraordinary claim to uphold because if even one part is falsifiable, then the whole thing must be rejected. It can no longer be trusted.

Even worse is the hypocrisy shown by certain politicians and corporate owner's in America claiming to be "Christian". Jesus would be considered a liberal socialist (if he even existed at all) that advocated for giving up material belongings, freely helping neighbors or those in need, not seeking power or wealth. Some people are walking examples of an oxymoron. Self-proclaimed "Christians" ignore the basic principles of Jesus' teachings and the ten commandments (thou shalt not kill).

If human perception of the universe is biased, and ever-changing, then what explanation can be given to why we have static morals and beliefs even in the face of change? Evolution has determined that it is desirable to have some ideas/traditions which remain static within a multi-generational time span. Society progresses on a much slower timescale, and society could progress faster if people were more perceptive to change; however, evolving too quickly could also be detrimental. For one, it's not a good idea to rush into new methodologies without proven experience, but we also need to accept change when necessary.

"Nothing is as powerful as an idea whose time has come."

The human lifespan is a significant timescale, and as life expectancy increases, this could have implications, i.e. larger conflicts arising due to the increasing gap between the youth and elderly. Religion offers a mechanism for young people to be indoctrinated into conservative groups, allowing static ideas to be retained through generations. This holds back society with a great force on a much larger scale. If you look back at the dark ages, intellectual stagnation (and even some regression) lasted for centuries, but I'm hopeful for the future of reason and logic.

Here's a little humor to close

Seperation of Church and State

America was built upon the notion of "Separation of Church and State," but what are its real implications, and is it even really possible (to the extent that politicians would not let their religious views affect their judgement)?

When I see articles like this and this, it makes me cringe (VIDEO). It makes me feel like society is being held back while simultaneously heading straight into a brick wall. This man is applying to be the HEAD OF THE ENERGY COMMITTEE, but he doesn't believe global warming is happening because a book written thousands of years ago has no mention of it. And he's not alone...
The problem is that people take Bible stories literally instead of learning and growing from the moral teachings of them. Wouldn't it be ironic if some modernized version of "Noah", (i.e. a minority like the scientific community) warned of a great flood, while the majority turned a blind eye in inconvenienced disbelief? Yeah...

Laziness and Comfort vs. Advancing

This is what I hear when businesses argue that reducing pollution costs too much:

"If we spend money designing cleaner technology, we won't have money to create more jobs."

Designing is jobs! Instead they'd rather reduce regulation, keeping a large force of unskilled workers that won't have to learn new skills/technology or strive for advancement. This is analogous to students in a class whining that an assignment is "too hard" and forcing the instructor to cancel it or reduce the expectations  The students won't excel or learn except that complaining gives them leverage.

People would rather spend their time finding ways to avoid working, than actually doing the work asked of them. I thought capitalism is supposed to solve the "lack of incentives" problem that communism failed at.

Superstition and the belief in science vs. religion

Firstly, let me point out that a "superstition" is simply a belief which has not been backed by the latest scientific findings; so a superstition can become scientific fact later, it's possible. Secondly, the term "atheism" is used loosely and often incorrectly. I prefer the more appropriate term "agnosticism", because whether or not god exists is quite literally the last question that science could ever hope to answer, so any belief (true/false) about that subject is a "superstition" per my definition above.  My point here is that you can still be superstitious about things, just NOT the things which science has clearly proven true/false.  Instead of debating unverifiable claims, it's better to discuss what we do/don't know, and how to proceed from there.

Let me also distinguish that science isn't a belief itself, but a (logical) process of hypothesizing, measuring, observing, verifying, debating and accepting evidence.  An appropriate belief would be that

Using the process of science can give us the answers [to everything].

Which I assume is a belief that all modern agnostics intrinsically hold, whether they're aware of it or not.

Also, by definition, people only hold beliefs which they believe to be true (regardless of whether they are actually true), and seeing two or more conflicting beliefs is very bothersome. It's also difficult to accept that others are "wrong" when you think you know the "true answer."  However, one has to succumb to the idea that all beliefs are inherently wrong/biased.  Scientific findings are based on simplifications/models and underlying assumptions about perceptions (that we may not even be aware of).  Science also rests upon the shoulders of philosophy, which still poses many unanswered questions through interesting thought-experiments.

However, a major difference between religion and the "belief in science" (also known as Scientism) is that scientific "truths" are dynamic, and allowed to be challenged with more rigorous science, whereas many religions are static (unless it's one of those pick-and-choose ordeals, in which case the religion is being diluted/debased and should just be disregarded entirely as a fallible source claiming to be infallible).  By our human nature, changing fundamental beliefs is difficult/painful, which is even more reason that scientists need to be able to readily alter/adapt their beliefs based on latest findings. This is not easy because people need some stability of perception. What if tomorrow we discover negative mass particles that behave oppositely to gravity? Our whole world would be turned upside down (haha, that was a pun).

Nonetheless, I personally choose to believe in something which has an effective basis for acquiring knowledge and subsequently verifying it.  So if agnostics want to unite for some common cause, it should be to point out that the process of science is useful/revealing, teaches us about our origins/universe, can save lives, that it's fun/interesting, that anyone can do it, and that it DOESN'T have all the answers, but this is a sandbox for curiosity and exploration.  People's trust in science will follow from there.